The Conversation
by IYSaotome
Summary: Set after Children's Crusade. After a devastating loss, Kate Bishop and Teddy Altman meet with the man who was most important to their fallen friend.


The Conversation

The Young Avengers are not mine. All rights and copyrights are held by the respective copyright holders. All feedback is greatly appreciated.

She didn't know what to say as she stood before the closed door inside of Avengers Mansion. She didn't know him. She had only heard stories from her friend. Her friend who was now gone. Kate Bishop held back the tears as she looked at the door that led to Scott Lang. Her friend, Teddy Altman was standing beside her. "We don't have to do this if you don't want to," he said.

"No, no, it's okay. I want to," said Kate.

Teddy nodded as he knocked on the door. And when the door opened, Scott saw the two teenagers at the door. He recognized them as Cassie's friends, even if he didn't know them. "Mr. Lang," Teddy said. "I'm Teddy Altman. This is Kate Bishop." Kate nodded her head.

"Hello," said Scott. "I'm sorry, there's a lot that I missed."

"We understand," Kate said. She and Teddy entered the room to see it filled with old newspapers detailing the exploits of the Young Avengers. Kate's eyes began to swell up.

"Kate," Teddy said as he put his hand on her shoulder.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Scott said. "I just…"

"You wanted to know what Cassie was doing while you were away," Kate said. "I understand, Mr. Lang. I really do. It was just unexpected."

"Where are the other Young Avengers?" Scott asked.

"Eli moved away. And Tommy doesn't want to stop to think about what happened. And Billy," Teddy stopped himself. He didn't know what to say.

"Billy's taking what happened really hard," Kate said.

Scott nodded. He understood. And the kids knew he understood.

"I guess you're wondering why we're here," Teddy said.

"You want… I don't know… Maybe you want closure," Scott said.

"Closure doesn't really exist in our world," Kate said.

"The last thing I remember before all of this was that my ex sued for complete custody. She told me something like this would happen and I didn't believe her," Scott told the kids. "We live in such a crazy world and Cassie was everything to me."

"She loved you," Teddy said. "She talked about you all the time."

Scott was silent. He sat on the bed and put his hands to his head.

"It's true. She wanted to make you proud," Kate said. "When I first met her, she had just heard about the Young Avengers. Billy and Teddy and Eli and Iron Lad."

"Iron Lad," Scott said, scornfully.

"He's Kang," Teddy said. "A teenage version of Kang. He wanted to fight against his perceived destiny. He brought us together. And he and Cassie really hit it off."

"What?" Scott said, unable to comprehend what he had just heard.

"We're getting ahead of ourselves," Kate said.

"We had been making the news for a little while before we met Cassie," Teddy said, taking a seat on a chair close to the bed.

"Some criminals were crashing my sister's wedding," Kate explained. "And these bozos tried to stop them."

"We did stop them," Teddy said.

"Not without my help," Kate interjected. "Anyway, after the battle, after Teddy and the others left, we were getting checked out at a hospital and then Cassie approached me."

"She approached you?" Scott asked.

"She wanted to know about the Young Avengers," Kate explained. "She wanted to join the team."

"Anyways, we were at Avengers Mansion when Cassie and Kate found us," Teddy said. "And they weren't the only ones. The mansion was in ruins by that point but Cap, Iron Man and Jewel were looking for us,"

"Jessica," Scott said. "We… dated for a brief moment."

"Really?" Kate asked. "Because she's married to Luke Cage."

"Oh, she married him? Good for them," Scott said sincerely.

"Iron Man told Cassie that he didn't want her doing this," Teddy said. "He was afraid he would lose her like he lost you."

"Ironic," Scott said softly.

"But Cassie wasn't deterred," Kate said. "She had been using your Pym Particles for so long that size-changing became natural to her."

"And that was when Kang arrived," Teddy said.

"Grown-Kang, right?" Scott asked.

"Yes," Kate said. "In addition to Iron Lad, grown-Kang came back. He wanted to set his younger self onto his proper path."

"And what happened?" Scott asked.

"We totally kicked his ass!" Teddy exclaimed.

"We were pretty awesome," Kate said.

"But Iron Lad, he really did leave us," Teddy said. "He had to face his destiny."

"He seemed like he was Kang when I saw him," Scott said.

"But because of that experience, we all joined together," Kate explained. "We became the Young Avengers. Even though the adults didn't approve."

"And Eli was taking MGH," Teddy said.

"Yeah, we found out after we beat Mr. Hyde," Kate said.

"He's always bragging about the one time he got a few lucky shots on Thor," Scott said.

"And then the Super-Skrull came to pick me up," Teddy said.

"Is this part of that Invasion thing I heard about?" Scott asked.

"No, that came later," Kate said.

"I'm half-Skrull," Teddy said. "And half-Kree."

"Really?" Scott asked.

"Really," Teddy said. "And believe it or not, but my father is Captain Mar-Vell."

"There's a name I haven't heard in a long time," Scott said. "He was always so proper. Even after he betrayed his people."

"I have some questions about him that we should probably save for another time," Teddy said.

"Alright," Scott said.

"Anyways, it was at this time that Iron Lad's armor came back online as the new Vision," Kate said.

"Cassie was seeing him, right?" Scott asked.

"She was," Kate said.

"I'm not too surprised," Scott said. "Wanda and even Carol have dated the Vision. He isn't some machine."

"We know," Teddy said.

"But they didn't start going out until later," Kate said. "After we beat back the Skrulls and Kree."

"With a little bit of help from the grown-up Avengers," Teddy said.

Scott nodded. "It sounds to me like another regular day for the Avengers."

"That's when things got really bad," Kate said.

"The super hero civil war?" Scott asked.

Teddy nodded. "We didn't know what to do. Friend against friend. Brother against brother. I'm just glad Billy didn't register too. I'd hate to have to really fight my boyfriend."

"Cassie ended up siding with Iron Man," Kate said.

"If there's anything I'm glad I missed, it's that," Scott said.

"After it was over, you'd have to ask someone else what Cassie was up to," Teddy said. "We sort of lost contact with her until the Invasion."

"But even after the Invasion, she and the Vision were conscripted into Hank Pym's Avengers," Kate said.

"Hank, huh," Scott mused.

"She did help stop an evil Inhuman from devolving humanity," Teddy said.

"And she figured out that Wanda wasn't really Wanda but actually Loki in disguise," Kate added.

"And she helped us kick the crap out of Norman Osborn and his team of Dark Avengers," Teddy said.

"It sounds like she was well on her way to becoming one of the greats," Scott said.

"She wasn't on her way, Mr. Lang," Kate said. "She already was one of the greats."

The End


End file.
